The EU Member States’ Development Ministers will discuss reconstruction aid for Ukraine, global health and the role of multilateral development banks in the context of multiple crises at their informal meeting in Stockholm on Wednesday 8 March in the evening and Thursday 9 March, convened by Sweden’s Minister for International Development Cooperation and Trade, Johan Forssell.
Global health is the subject of this Wednesday evening’s dinner, to which the Director-General of the World Health Organization (WHO), Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, is invited.
The Ministers will discuss the EU Global Health Strategy - the external counterpart of the European Health Union - which the EU adopted in November 2022 at the initiative of the High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, Josep Borrell (see EUROPE 13108/13, 13074/22).
The EU’s objective is geopolitical: to be the leader of a strengthened global governance of health, with the WHO at its centre and, in its sights, the future legally binding international Agreement or Treaty on pandemics, to be concluded in May 2024, after amending the 2005 International Health Regulations.
The fourth meeting of the intergovernmental negotiating body concluded on 3 February in Geneva on the zero draft of this instrument, which will strengthen WHO’s role in the prevention, preparedness and response to future pandemics (see EUROPE 13130/5, 13081/22).
The role of multilateral development banks. On Thursday, the Ministers will have an exploratory exchange of views on the role of multilateral development banks, such as the World Bank, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) and the European Investment Bank (EIB), “in the face of global challenges and vulnerabilities, such as climate change, pandemics and armed conflicts”, says the Swedish Presidency of the EU Council.
Aid to Ukraine. Thursday’s lunch will be devoted to an exchange of views on the continuation of humanitarian and in-kind assistance, and especially on the support of the EU and its Member States for the early and long-term reconstruction of the war-torn country, which is a candidate for EU membership.
Ukraine is indeed the top priority of the Swedish Presidency of the EU Council, including in the field of development, as Mr Forssell has repeatedly stressed (see EUROPE 13108/13, 13092/7).
See the WHO ‘Zero’ Draft Agreement, Convention or Treaty on Pandemics: https://aeur.eu/f/5oo (Original version in French by Aminata Niang)